Graphic arts jobs prepared for packaging printing use a special workflow. The workflow is dependent upon the design of the intended package. A package is often a cardboard box used to carry commercial merchandise, such as electronic devices or food products. Each box comes in different sizes, with different graphic art content printed on each box.
FIG. 1 illustrates a design of such a packaging element 10, showing a flattened two-dimensional representation of a package. Such designs are often prepared by computer aided design (CAD) applications such as ArtiosCad from EskoArtworks or Impact from Arden Software.
FIGS. 2A, 2B, and 2C each illustrates a different content applied on a packaging element 10 forming different packages 22, 24, and 26. A typical example can be a juice product manufacturer. Each package has an identical design with different content printed on them, for example citrus, orange, and apple juices. The graphic art design and content is often prepared by graphic arts designers using packages such as Adobe Creative Suite or Quark Xpress.
FIG. 3 illustrates an example of a designed printed imposition sheet 30. The imposition sheet example contains four identical packaging elements 34 populated on same imposition sheet.
A packaging element 10 is typically a non-rectangular shape as is shown in FIG. 1. Organizing such shapes on a given printed imposition sheet 30 is achieved by dedicated package design applications such as Pandora or StepOne from Kodak. A packaging design workflow will include at least the following steps:                1. Design the step and repeat the packaging shape only resulting with a text file written according to at least one of the following packaging oriented file formats: CFF2/DDES2/DXF containing sheets size information and data describing the single packaging shape and step, and repeat of each instance. Each step contains position and orientation information.        2. The data created in the first step will be imported by a graphic art design step and repeat application such as Kodak Pandora. Each repeat will be assigned graphic arts (artworks) information. The application user may further populate all repeats with the same artwork, or may assign different artworks for different repeats.        3. The data from the first step is converted into Postscript/PDF and imported into a design package such as Adobe Creative Suite where each repeat is assigned graphic arts (artworks) information in a manual fashion. The user may further populate all repeats within the same artwork, or may assign different artworks for different repeats.        
With the introduction of personalized printing, each printed document can directly be addressed to a specific recipient. Such personal documents can accommodate personal information such as name and address, but may also allow different image content. For example, an advertisement can be directed to populations that differ in age, wealth, and venue. Variable data printing (VDP) jobs are well established, however, it is not used for, or easily adapted to, design and print of packaging jobs.
The proposed invention described hereunder provides a solution for variable data printing in packaging printing.